Five years ago this June, Tim Huber\u2019s life changed in a big way.<\/p>\n
Huber, a former Juneau Empire reporter and current Haines resident, was living in West Virginia and working for the Associated Press. With a fellow reporter, he\u2019d just filed a damning story on safety fraud committed by Massey Energy, a coal company whose unsafe practices had led to the death of 29 people in a deadly blast a year before.<\/p>\n
Huber got home and was changing to go to the pool and join his wife, Helen Alten, and their two children, Aurora and Brandt Alten-Huber, when he fell over. Only 45 years old, he\u2019d had a stroke \u2014 a brain bleed that ended up affecting a softball-sized area of his brain.<\/p>\n
He lay there for at least two hours, until Helen got worried \u2014 Tim was usually very timely. She and their kids came home to check on him.<\/p>\n
The casserole she\u2019d asked him to take out the oven was still there (fortunately, it was on a timer and had switched off.) And they couldn\u2019t find Tim anywhere.<\/p>\n
He was hidden behind a door, unable to move, though he\u2019d heard them looking for him. After the EMTs took him away, his memories stopped \u2014 for two months. When he woke up, he was in a strange room, partially paralyzed. Nothing he said made sense to other people.<\/p>\n
But he wasn\u2019t afraid, because photos of his family wallpapered the room.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
CAREER AND MARRIAGE<\/strong><\/p>\n Tim Huber wrote some big stories over his career; one of the biggest he worked on during his years at the Juneau Empire ended up bringing him and Helen together.<\/p>\n He was working the Saturday shift at the paper in January 1993 when he came across a strange item in the police blotter \u2014 around 4:30 a.m., state senator George Jacko had called police multiple times, asking for help gaining access to the hotel room of a female aide for another legislator. Jacko had said it was official business, and had pounded on the door so hard other guests had woken up and called to see what was the matter.<\/p>\n After Tim broke that news, the story quickly blew up. It came out that he had passed notes to another aide, telling her he\u2019d vote a certain way if she\u2019d go on a date with him. (She refused but kept the notes, disturbed.) There were also other instances of harassment.<\/p>\n Helen, then president of the American Association of University Women in Alaska, was one of those who signed a public letter about the scandal. Tim called her to find out more.<\/p>\n \u201cNo comment,\u201d she told him. Another reporter thought they\u2019d get along; their next conversation was longer.<\/p>\n In 1994, they married at the Russian Orthodox church in downtown Juneau, filling the small space with so many people in that while two fainted, they were packed so tight they didn\u2019t fall down.<\/p>\n Also in 1994, a subcommittee of the Senate ethics committee censured Jacko on three counts of ethics violations, effectively ending his political career.<\/p>\n That story was one of the biggest Huber worked on in Juneau \u2014 but he\u2019s worked on big stories in many places.<\/p>\n While in Minnesota, he spent three months investigating then-governor Tim Pawlenty\u2019s role in a telecommunications company accused of scamming people; turns out Pawlenty was one of the directors of that company\u2019s parent company, was one of the investors, and received more than $50,000 from them as a consultant and legal advisor.<\/p>\n And then there\u2019s the story Tim filed just hours before his stroke.<\/p>\n An April 5, 2010 explosion had killed 29 people at Massey Energy\u2019s Upper Big Branch coal mine, and Tim, along with another AP reporter, Vicki Smith, discovered the company had kept two sets of safety records. One was the record they shared with the public. The other was the actual, accurate record of safety violations and hazards.<\/p>\n As Tim was lying on the floor in his home, the story he and Smith wrote was spreading. Those facts would end up helping to send the company\u2019s former CEO Don Blankenship to federal prison for a year and be fined $250,000 for \u201cconspiracy to willfully violate mine health and safety standards,\u201d according to the United States Department of Justice.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n THE STROKE<\/strong><\/p>\n As the EMTs were carrying him to the ambulance, Tim gave Helen \u201ca little saucy wink \u2014 he was trying to make me feel better,\u201d Helen said. \u201cBut he was getting worse.\u201d<\/p>\n Soon after his wink, Tim\u2019s missing two months begin.<\/p>\n After he got to the hospital, the doctor pulled Helen aside. He told her to call Tim\u2019s family, because he wouldn\u2019t live through the night.<\/p>\n His mother and youngest brother came, but Tim kept \u201changing in there.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere was a really good therapist who said to me\u2026 every hour counts,\u201d Helen said.<\/p>\n A week into Tim\u2019s five-week stay in intensive care, Helen traveled with Tim\u2019s editor, Brian, to the office so she could clean out his desk. She found coffee, caffeine tabs, power drinks. The bureau where Tim worked had recently shrunk from 14 to four people, and Tim had been overworked, Helen said.<\/p>\n \u201cI was just horrified by how much he\u2019d been doing to keep himself awake so he could be a good father, a good (reporter),\u201d Helen said.<\/p>\n She was still cleaning out his desk when the hospital called her and told her Tim was dying.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was like a punch in the gut,\u201d she said. \u201cI just sort of buckled over and couldn\u2019t breathe.\u201d<\/p>\n When she returned to the hospital, the neurosurgeon told her that Tim\u2019s brain was trying to repair itself by sending fluid to the injured areas, which added pressure and only hurt him further. It would kill him in 24 to 48 hours if they did nothing.<\/p>\n Then he told her about an experimental treatment that would stop Tim\u2019s brain swelling. They\u2019d remove a circular piece of Tim\u2019s skull, hinging it on, to allow for the brain to expand. When she asked, the surgeon told her that if it were him, he wouldn\u2019t want the surgery.<\/p>\n Helen thought about it. \u201cI said, well, I\u2019m going to gamble\u2026 my gut tells me to do this. I\u2019m going to do it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n He survived, though it made him look \u201creally interesting\u201d for a while, Helen said.<\/p>\n \u201cNow I\u2019m handsome,\u201d Tim added.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t a magic trick, however. In the weeks after the surgery Tim sometimes \u201cneurostormed\u201d \u2014 his brain entered a frenzy of activity that can cause the patient to get hot, to get cold, to have a heart attack, to have seizures.<\/p>\n Helen stayed with him as much as she could, holding his hand. Aurora and Brandt were only nine years old.<\/p>\n When he started to improve, \u201cthey wanted to put him in a nursing home,\u201d Helen said. \u201cAll the data I read said when a stroke person comes in a nursing home, they don\u2019t get out. I said no way in hell am I putting my husband in a nursing home.\u201d<\/p>\n She fought to get Tim admitted to the hospital\u2019s rehabilitation ward instead.<\/p>\n \u201cThe rehab doctor said \u2018No way.\u2019 Said he\u2019s nonresponsive. I kept pushing it,\u201d she said. She got the doctor to visit three times. The third time, the doctor agreed to admit him. Helen decorated the room with family photos, with Brandt and Aurora\u2019s drawings, and \u201cevery single card he got,\u201d including those from politicians and sources.<\/p>\n That\u2019s when he remembers waking up. The first thing he remembers thinking is \u201cWhere am I? Where\u2019s Helen and where are the kids?\u201d Someone came into the room. He tried to ask her.<\/p>\n What came out, Tim said, was \u201cgobbledygook.\u201d<\/p>\n When he woke up, he had aphasia \u2014 a condition that scrambles his words between his brain and his mouth. Tim has no problem understanding anything anyone says to him, though in his initial months it took him longer than normal to process. (Some people, who suffer from a different kind of aphasia, have trouble listening correctly.) The real difficulty for Tim comes when he speaks \u2014 he may intend to say one thing, but something completely different can come out. The same condition has put a stop both to reading and writing, though he\u2019s now able to read a few sentences.<\/p>\n \u201cAphasia doesn\u2019t mean you\u2019re stupid,\u201d Helen said. \u201cIt\u2019s that linkage of communication is broken.\u201d<\/p>\n Another common effect of a stroke is a loss of self-motivation. Helen began setting tasks for Tim, determined, she told a therapist, that he would dance at his children\u2019s weddings.<\/p>\n \u201cHe needed to be pushed, and he needed to be pushed hard,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Helen had to push against those who would have kicked him out of treatment, as well.<\/p>\n \u201cIn three to six months, most people plateau,\u201d Helen said. \u201cThat\u2019s because that\u2019s when insurance ends.\u201d<\/p>\n The outpatient therapist would tell Helen that Tim was plateauing \u2014 then she would take him to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago.<\/p>\n \u201cHe went in a wheelchair. He came back with a quad cane,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd then a straight cane.\u201d<\/p>\n They focused on what they saw as most important \u2014 Tim\u2019s ability to walk and his ability to speak. They didn\u2019t spend much time on his right arm, and \u201cit never came back,\u201d Helen said.<\/p>\n He\u2019s now been in therapy for five straight years, and he can walk with a cane. Just this year he began to speak in sentences, something Helen describes as a miracle. The brain bleed means his brain has had to find ways to work around a damaged section the size of a softball.<\/p>\n Two or three of his speech therapists thought Tim would never be able to communicate, Helen said.<\/p>\n He\u2019s also had to learn a new way of walking \u2014 the muscles most able-bodied people use don\u2019t work the same way for him in his right leg.<\/p>\n He can\u2019t write or read much anymore, and uses adaptive technology to read articles in magazines; he listens to books (mysteries are his favorite) on tape.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s the thing that we learned from Chicago,\u201d Helen said. \u201cAnything is possible\u2026. the way our world is created, it\u2019s created for people with two legs and two hands. We can change the way we do it. Just change the paradigm and machinery.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n LIFE IN HAINES<\/strong><\/p>\n After Tim\u2019s stroke, Helen realized she needed to find a job with health benefits. Two-and-a-half years ago, the family returned to Alaska. They now live in Haines, where Helen is the director of the Sheldon Museum & Cultural Center.<\/p>\n They didn\u2019t realize that when they returned, they\u2019d be fighting with some people unable to realize, or consider, what Tim was capable of.<\/p>\n \u201cIn West Virginia, they thought he was ready to drive, but the guys here (at the Department of Motor Vehicles) wouldn\u2019t test him,\u201d Helen said.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was amazing the stuff people said to us,\u201d she said. \u201cOne of the doctors said if he saw Tim drive a car, he would report him.\u201d<\/p>\n He passed the written test when Helen read him the questions \u2014 another thing they got a hard time about \u2014 but wasn\u2019t allowed to even take the road test. His occupational therapist wrote a note vouching for him; other states allow that, but Alaska requires a doctor\u2019s note. State troopers in Alaska heard the discussion \u2014 the DMV and state troopers in Haines share an office \u2014 and called West Virginia to get them to revoke the license Tim had. (Helen called the West Virginia DMV to inquire why his license had been \u201cfrozen,\u201d and that\u2019s what they told her, she said.)<\/p>\n Finally, after years of effort, West Virginia took Tim\u2019s occupational therapist\u2019s letter and restored his license. Staffing changed at the DMV. And Tim and Helen found a doctor who agreed to write not that Tim was \u201csafe to drive,\u201d (something Helen doubts any doctor would write, at risk of their medical license) but that he was safe to be tested.<\/p>\n \u201cLuckily, that little change in language, they accepted in Anchorage,\u201d Helen said. \u201cThen the new woman at the DMV tested him and said \u2018He passes. He\u2019s fine.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n He does all of the family\u2019s grocery shopping, and also drives a tractor \u2014 since he can\u2019t read and write anymore, he\u2019s decided to be a farmer.<\/p>\n Tim is receiving this year\u2019s Consumer Advocate award from SAIL. He and Helen think it\u2019s in part because he fought so hard to receive his license.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n SAIL AWARD<\/strong><\/p>\n The SAIL (Southeast Alaska Independent Living) Consumer Advocate of the Year award is given to someone in Southeast \u201cwho experiences a disability, that has demonstrated a commitment and resolve to furthering the causes of people experiencing disabilities, advocating for individuals to live the lives they dream in the community of their choice,\u201d wrote SAIL assistant director Tristan Knutson-Lombardo in an email. \u201cSince his stroke, and relocating to Haines, Tim has worked hard to follow his new passions while not allowing his disability to limit himself (or allow others to limit him because of his disability).\u201d<\/p>\n Cheryl Putnam won the award in 2011; Merle Ritter won in 2008.<\/p>\n Lynn Marvel will also be honored this year with the SAIL Community Advocate of the Year award for her work \u201cto break down barriers that people with disabilities face each day,\u201d Knutson-Lombardo wrote. \u201cLynn worked in the Juneau School District for more than two decades as a teacher and administrator of, and advocate for, students with disabilities and their families. Her passion for her work inspired countless students with disabilities to reach their educational and vocational goals,\u201d he added. Allen Marine won in 2013, Eaglecrest Ski Area in 2014, and Sara Boesser in 2015.<\/p>\n The event is SAIL\u2019s fall auction and dinner, scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 8, 6 p.m. at Centennial Hall. This year has a tropical theme; Jamie Waste will emcee, and a local dance group will perform. There are also more than 100 items available for purchase at auction, including vacation packages, local tours, tools and jewelry. Proceeds will support SAIL\u2019s work to \u201c\u2018inspire personal independence\u2019 for seniors and people experiencing disabilities,\u201d Knutson-Lombardo wrote.<\/p>\n Tim will give a speech at SAIL\u2019s event, with the help of his speech therapist.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n VISION<\/strong><\/p>\n Now, since he can\u2019t write, Tim has decided he wants to be a farmer. He\u2019s driven a tractor for Haines farmer George Campbell. And this year, Helen and Tim filled their front yard with peonies they sold at Haines\u2019 farmers markets; it\u2019s easier for Tim to work with a crop he doesn\u2019t have to bend down for.<\/p>\n \u201cCollege fund,\u201d Tim added \u2014 he\u2019s hoping that eventually, he will farm enough peonies, successfully enough, to help pay for college for Aurora and Brandt, now freshmen in high school.<\/p>\n In Chicago, \u201cthey told me\u2026 the people that get better have a goal and a vision,\u201d as well as a good caregiver, Helen said. \u201cTim\u2019s vision is he\u2019s going to be a farmer and dance at his kids\u2019 weddings.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n You can read the article Tim and Vicki Smith filed for the AP just before Tim\u2019s stroke here, among other places:<\/p>\n http:\/\/www.sandiegouniontribune.com\/sdut-wva-mine-faked-safety-logs-before-fatal-blast-2011jun29-story.html<\/p>\n For more information about SAIL, its outdoor recreation program, ORCA, or the banquet, go to http:\/\/www.sailinc.org\/.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Five years ago this June, Tim Huber\u2019s life changed in a big way. 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